Monday, November 24, 2014

Every once in a while it’s good to be reminded of how great some companies were before entering a period of constant failure – with critics and gamers alike. Case in question: Konami, specifically the division that takes care of shoot’em ups. I’m not even fond of the gameplay concept behind the TwinBee series (or maybe I’m negatively biased by the excruciatingly raw difficulty of the first arcade game), and yet I consider Pop’n TwinBee a near masterpiece of the cute’em up subgenre. I revisited the game a few days ago after a long strenuous day, which probably left me in a predisposed condition to enjoy it in a single victorious credit. I played only once and looped it to top my previous best in more than a million points. The next day I came back to check if my understanding of bells was actually correct so that I could write about it.

Developed from the ground up for the Super Nintendo and released only in Japan and Europe, Pop’n TwinBee came after Detana!! TwinBee and before TwinBee Yahho!, the only real arcade sequels to the original TwinBee. Counting all chapters released until 1993 it’s the sixth entry in the series, and I guess Konami's cumulated experience is one of the reasons for the level of polish applied to every aspect of the game. Graphics, colors and music unite to provide one of the best examples of a great cute shooter, one that’s capable of truly wowing the player while leaving out undesirable characteristics such as drabness, stiffness, unfair or non-existent challenge and excessively quirky or sexualized character designs (okay, to be honest I don’t mind this last one).

There is a story going on involving two main characters (player 1 in blue as TwinBee, player 2 in pink as WinBee), a damsel in distress (rescued at the end of the first stage) and a mad scientist/villain that must be defeated in the final level. The beginning of this story is unveiled in the images shown during the game's attract mode.

First level of Pop'n TwinBee(courtesy of YouTube user RudyC3)

After pressing start you'll be asked to enter your name and select one of three option configurations: trailing, rotating or forming a lateral moving barrier. Basic attacks remain the same as in previous games, which in the default configuration correspond to shot (B) and ground bombs (Y). Pop'n TwinBee expands on the basics by adding a stock-based smart bomb called chibi (A) and a powerful short-reach punch triggered by holding and releasing button Y (the chibi bomb makes you invincible while the ship expels lots of lethal bouncing miniatures of itself). Each cloud that appears in the horizon hides a bell, the secret to both powering up and scoring. Bells change colors as you hit them, and depending on their color when collected you'll receive a different upgrade or bonus. As they get hit bells switch back and forth between orange and other colors, as described below:

orange: gives a score bonus that starts at 500 and maxes out at 10.000 points if you don't let any bell fall down the screen;

gray: soft straight shot;

purple: 3-way shot that works somewhat in a scattered pattern;

green: option that provides additional firepower, up to 4 can be activated;

pink: shield, protects against 4 hits;

blue: speed-up (every 4th works as a speed-down, reverting the ship back to its default starting speed);

blinking gray: extra bomb.

Unlike in previous chapters, in this game lives are replaced by a single health bar that gets refilled at the start of every level. Each hit takes away a portion of the health bar and one of the options you have activated, while pink hearts uncovered by specific ground enemies serve to refill the health bar. Once the health bar is depleted it's game over, and that makes the shield the single most important item of the game: every time it was about to disappear (when it's pink) I would start cooking another pink bell to get it back to blue. My favorite weapon is the 3-way shot since it's more powerful and has side coverage, much useful to hit a few enemies and bosses without getting in front of their vertically aimed bullets.

At first I thought the punch move was useless, but then I changed my mind when I found out it's able to destroy some of the more resilient enemies in a single blow. Those seemingly invincible watermelons of the first stage, for instance, will be instantly sliced to pieces when you punch them. Granted, in later levels things get so hectic that using punches becomes naturally riskier, but whenever there's a breathing window it's always good to have a punch prepared to hit something. After all, it can even deflect bullets!

Flying grapes and rowing minions!

Pop'n TwinBee is artistically one of the most pleasing games in the SNES library. Lots of personality, varied design, catchy music and top notch animation on bosses are the obvious highlights, but the game also excels technically. I haven't tried playing in co-op, but on solo play there is no slowdown whatsoever. The graphic trip allows you to soar above castles and fortresses guarded by all sorts of cute creatures from vegetables to mechanical machines, as well as navigate deep oceans and take down a huge flying battleship. Most bosses are multi-jointed and rendered with cool effects, moving a lot around the screen as they try to crush the player. When they're defeated you're greeted with a shower of bells that can result in a huge amount of points if you're able to collect them all. I think at least two speed-ups are needed to succeed at that.

Konami also infused the 2-player mode with extra bits of gameplay. From what I could check, if you're able to play with a friend you'll both be allowed to throw each other against enemies by using button R. And if your ally is low in health it's possible to transfer part of your own energy by pressing X. By switching GAME MODE from "normal" to "couple" in the options the computer will aim most attacks on player 1 instead of player 2, in a particularly clever way to allow less experienced players to tag along. Got kids or nephews? This seems perfect for you then!

I replayed the game on Normal (difficulty 4) with TwinBee (player 1) and selected the trailing options. I scored 52% more than my previous best and died in stage 2-3. It wasn't that hard, but I definitely had a blast doing it.

Even with so many games released for it I could never fathom the appeal of the Wonder Boy series. My only previous contact with it was on the Master System as I was very little, and I don’t even remember which game it was. Initially presented in the arcades as a pure platformer, the series soon incorporated other styles of gameplay, and as the shmup representative in this hybrid history Wonder Boy III - Monster Lair mixes platform sections with standard horizontal shooting. This game also bears the distinction of being the last arcade entry in the Wonder Boy series and the only chapter to allow 2-player simultaneous play. Player one controls a boy named Leo and player two controls a princess named Papillo.

The best option for those who want to know this universe better is volume 29 of the Sega Ages 2500 series for the Playstation 2, titled Monster World Complete Collection. It contains every single chapter and all their official variations, with the exception of the PC Engine port for Wonder Boy III - Monster Lair (which is understandable because it wasn’t handled by Sega).

Getting in the mood to play the arcade version of Wonder Boy III doesn’t require much if you’re fond of lighthearted 16-bit graphics. Everything is very bright and colorful, with a fluffy atmosphere that immediately evokes feelings of easygoing and joyous fun. But wait... Why then did I spend so much time with the game, and a good portion of it swearing at the TV screen as I got shafted over and over by cute representations of vultures and snowmen? Laugh at the cheesy graphics and mock me as you will, but to me Wonder Boy III is absolutely no piece of cake. It offers one of the most evil kinds of challenge you can have in a game, where failure is served on a plate with a happy face staring back at you (Twinkle Star Sprites, I haven’t forgotten thee).

Beach balls in the village!

Each one of the 14 stages/rounds in Wonder Boy III - Monster Lair has two parts. The first one is a platforming area with automatic scrolling (it scrolls even faster if you advance to the right side of the screen), and the second one has the character flying a pet dragon in order to face the stage boss in his “lair”. Themes vary throughout and include the typical tropical settings of previous Wonder Boy games as well as jungle, castle, villages, ice, desert and spaceship (last level only). There are no graphic frills whatsoever, it’s just the foreground and a layer of parallax in the background. Because the game is so long some of them get repeated after a while, and the same happens to the music. The enemy gallery consists of several sorts of animals, plants and weird creatures, all rendered with cute or goofy sprites. Bosses are quite amusing and remind me of Fantasy Zone, seeing that they’re generally large and shift from their natural colors to red as you hit them.

For the platform areas controls consist of jumping and shooting (configurable as you wish), with shot types switched by collecting weapon icons left by enemies. All six weapons are active for 10 seconds only and revert back to the default pea shot after a while: spread rings, two-way rocks, drill shot, exploding missiles, rotating shurikens and expanding fire circle. Weapon behavior is the same during the shmup section, but there are a few rules that should be noted if you want to stay alive in both parts of a level. For instance, it’s very important to collect the fruits/vegetables that appear hanging in the air during the platform areas, since they serve as fuel for the vitality gauge that determines your current life. This gauge is constantly drained while platforming and can only de replenished by taking fruits or weapon items. A life is lost either when it gets depleted or when you get touched by an enemy. With very few exceptions, all enemies in Wonder Boy III fire this single colored beach ball that takes away a small amount of health instead of killing you instantly. Even though avoiding/dodging beach balls is hardly needed when platforming, balls cause the character to trip uncontrollably into whatever lies ahead. That’s probably the main cause of death in this game, besides getting rammed by one of those cute creatures and falling into abysses due to poorly timed jumps.

Extracting more energy and more points from fruits is possible by hitting the ones that recognize hits and grow to explode into four fruits of the same kind (apples, lemons and pears). Another way to increase their energy and point value is by freeing and collecting the pink fairy. She shows up floating inside a bubble, moving three times in a wide open arch before fleeing. Once touched she will cast a spell on the character and turn all subsequent fruits into cakes for a brief while. Not only do cakes fill up the energy gauge faster, but they also give you more points than normal. Watch out for the blue fairy as well because she grants a very welcome invincibility window that can be used to get through lots of delicate parts without getting hit. Lastly, the black fairy is evil and should be avoided. Don’t fret if you get touched by it though, all it does is void whatever weapon you’re carrying at the moment.

What makes Wonder Boy III a tough challenge despite the childish looks is the autoscrolling nature of the platforming parts. It adds an extra layer of pressure that requires instant adaptation to enemies and weapons. Even when you have the stage fully figured out you can still die because of an inappropriate weapon or because a juicy fruit lured you into falling onto the enemy’s lap. Patience is key, but the more you know how to deal with weapons the more prepared you are to evade the traps set by the game. It’s possible, for instance, to enable a different shot button with autofire. The trick (or hindrance, depends on your point of view) is that some of the weapons behave differently with autofire. The default pea shot and the rotating shurikens will have very short reach due to their increased rate of fire, but the good news is that they are devastating at close range. Exploding rockets have a very specific behavior because they normally blow up at close range if you use either the regular or autofire buttons. However, if you just hold the regular shot they will travel the whole length of the screen.

Co-op credit feeding in the first two stages(courtesy of YouTube user Randomized Gaming)

The shooting sections of the game are as straightforward as they get. You have to kill waves of a particular enemy before fighting the boss, both thematically related to the stage itself. These are the bosses, in stage order: a fish, a snake, a bat, a queen bee, a skull, a dodgeball match against a puppet, an ice gorilla, a cactus, a vampire, a mushroom mutated into a slot machine, a crab, an ogre, a knight with detachable hand and a space dragon. They’re mostly very large, and in my opinion the hardest ones are that awful cactus and the knight of stage 13. As for regular enemies, the most aggressive are the waves of mushrooms and snowmen. By far the best weapon against bosses is the exploding rocket, which can take some of them out in seconds. Just avoid taking the rotating shurikens unless you’re about to fight a boss where it’s undoubtedly useful, which in my case are the snake from stage 2 and the bat from stage 3. Hint: stay low and do not shoot while approaching the skull in stage 5 or you’ll die instantly (I actually don’t know if this is a bug or not).

Part of what makes up the scoring system of Wonder Boy III was already mentioned above (expanding fruits and cakes from the pink fairy). The other main source of points is in boss fights: a no-hit kill with a full vitality meter results in a full bonus of 5.600 points. That’s also good for survival because the remaining energy at the end of the level is always transported to the next stage (remember that when you die you’re respawned with only half the meter full). Finally, every single item is also worth some points, so the more you collect them the more you score. Speaking of which, collecting successive weapons of the same type extends its duration for a good amount of time. That’s very useful if you happen to come across multiple exploding rockets before the boss, for example.

If by any chance you decide to play this game be prepared for the huge difficulty leap that comes in stage 8. Everything in that level was designed to eat away our lives in a snap: cactuses explode into one or three beach balls, waves of vultures ram into your position at random, scorpions take lots of hits to die and snakes can only be killed if you carry certain weapons. On top of that, that cactus boss is totally unpredictable. In my worst credits I lost all my hard earned lives there, including the four extends gained with 50, 100, 180 and 300 thousand points. The rest of the later half of the game comes with trickier platforming hazards, such as exploding mushrooms and higher cliffs that must be “climbed” by hanging on to their tips (hold and release the jump button for better results).

At the time of its release the game was soon ported to the Mega Drive (in Japan only) and the PC Engine (Japan and US). Available options for the arcade version of Wonder Boy III - Monster Lair on the Playstation 2 include total customization of inputs and settings, gallery/library modes with lots of original material on the game, options to record/view replays and a handful of display settings. There's also a save function that must be done manually, with automatic loading while booting the disc. The arcade original is fun as a whole but also extremely punishing, and that’s why I feel I didn’t enjoy it as much as I had expected. Plus the weapon system randomly screwing the player doesn’t help at all in its appreciation. In my 1CC run on Normal I started the 13th level already on my last life, so I’m very proud of having played the rest of the game without dying... Those last levels are full of traps and that knight boss hates me!

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

If I was an SNES fan back in 1991 I would’ve wet my pants if I knew Thunder Force III was going to be released for the console. Fanboyism aside, I’d probably be aware of how awesome a shooter it was. A copyright issue concerning Sega and Technosoft led to the change in the game’s name, but this could also be related to the fact that Thunder Spirits is more an adaptation of the arcade port Thunder Force AC than Thunder Force III. I use to joke about this making it a second generation port, however there is absolutely no excuse as to why it resulted in such a disappointment, especially for those who had already been exposed to the wonders of Thunder Force III.

There’s no other way to put it, Thunder Spirits is the poor cousin and the black sheep in the mainstream Thunder Force family (meaning the part that doesn’t include the obscure first chapter). Thunder Spirits is also largely used by Sega fanboys who love to jest at the lower speed of the SNES processor. Looking at it bluntly one can’t help but agree with the derogatory statements, since the game seems to run in permanent slowdown whenever you’re shooting. I for one would blame Seika and Toshiba because there’s absolutely no explicit reason to have such a degraded adaptation on a 16-bit console that has grade-A stuff like Axelay, Macross and R-Type III. The SNES was perfectly capable to handle the port better.

That said, this game isn’t a total waste. It’s kinda like Raiden Trad, but a little better. You can’t really trash the influence of an excellent source, can you?

A little taste of Hydra on the SNES(courtesy of YouTube user djgyixx)

The first thing you need to do in Thunder Spirits is to press SELECT + START at the start screen in order to toggle autofire on. Then you’re all set to enjoy eight stages of horizontal shooting fun modeled after Thunder Force AC, as initially indicated by the status bar positioned in the lower portion of the image. By default the controls work with A (fire), L (change speed) and R (select weapon), but you’re allowed to remap buttons at will at the options screen mentioned above. Everything about the gameplay remains the same: starting with two default weapons (twin shot and back-fire), win enhancements or other weapons by collecting their icons (red S, B, F, W and H); get the claw item to gain two rotating options that amplify firepower and provide protection against normal bullets; find the blue S item and get a 3-hit shield; find and grab 1UPs to increase both the life stock and the final bonus upon completing the game. Die and lose the weapon you're currently carrying, except for the default ones.

While there’s nothing blatantly wrong with how it plays, Thunder Spirits lacks the flair that made Thunder Force III a great experience. Graphics are fine throughout but voices now look like something out of a Parodius game. After you get the claw item slowdown kicks in because the game simply cannot handle the amount of on-screen action. The overall consequence is that at default conditions Thunder Spirits in even easier than Thunder Force III. Never mind bumping the difficulty to mania (very hard) because the challenge increase is pretty minimal and the rewards are the same in the end (there is no additional score bonus for playing in a higher difficulty setting). Extends are aplenty and come with 100.000 points and then for every 200.000 points afterwards.

Another aspect that brings Thunder Spirits down a bit is the lower tempo and the general subdued nature of the soundtrack – as opposed to the stronger emphasis easily noticed on sound effects, especially for the ship’s weapons. By the way, these have gone through minor changes in order to make them more powerful than before. For example, either enemies have gotten weaker or the efficiency of the fire and hunter weapons has been enhanced a good deal (besides them being slightly beefed up graphically). And note how most bosses won’t put up any decent fight. Poor Gargoyle doesn’t even have a chance to shoot his fireballs if you hit his weak spot with the lasers as he enters the screen. King Fish, one of the most feared opponents in previous incarnations, is left in severe disadvantage due to the massive slowdown.

The new battleship level in Thunder Spirits

If we plot a straight line starting in Thunder Force III and ending in Thunder Spirits to compare both titles, practically half the game is somewhat altered. Again, most changes derive directly from the treatment applied in Thunder Force AC, such as the player not being able to select the starting stages anymore, the new outer space level that replaces ice planet Ellis and the new level inspired by one of the stages from Thunder Force II, which replaces the caves from Haides. Exclusive to the SNES iteration are the reworked spaceship stage (plus a brand-new boss) and the additional stretch before the fight against a dumbed-down final boss. Having now played all of these versions, I honestly think that the original Ellis and Haides planets from Thunder Force III are the best-looking of them all and shouldn’t have been excluded.

In short, if you fancy an easygoing shooter on your Super Nintendo and you haven’t been exposed to Thunder Force III on the Mega Drive yet, Thunder Spirits will fit the bill. It’s not atrocious and it’s fun while it lasts. I just recommend trying the original game next so you’ll have an idea of how much cooler it is in comparison.

By beating Thunder Spirits you unlock special lines in the options screen, which allow you to listen to the game's soundtrack and tinker with the starting number of lives and the extend routine. I played at full defaults on Normal with autofire and cleared the game on one life. Each life left in the end is worth 1 million points regardless of the chosen difficulty.

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Action Fighter didn’t really belong to the lower and more unknown rank of Sega arcade games, but it does seem to be the case considering how obscure it is. Coming out in between the most successful titles developed by the company, the arcade game got easily eclipsed by the likes of Out Run and Thunder Blade. Of all ports released for it, the most famous is probably the one made for the Master System soon after the arcade board hit the market. By all means it’s a very primitive-looking shooter, but given how early an entry it was in the console library I believe this 8-bit version of Action Fighter pulls quite a stunt with its meager 1 Mega power tag.

Taking direct inspiration from (not to say shamelessly cloning) Midway’s racing shooter Spy Hunter, Action Fighter blends the style of the competition with more traditional vertical shooting sections. Lots of compromises were made while adapting the arcade material, but at least the Master System game is able to retain the original frantic atmosphere that keeps you on your toes all the time. Make no mistake, the high degree of randomness in the gameplay makes Action Fighter one of the hardest shmups on the Master System. Nothing is etched in stone and lots of practice is needed to overcome the challenge of completing five missions commissioned by the president himself.

Some information sources point to the fact that the motorcycle you start the game with is the same one from Sega’s own classic Hang On. The initial objective of the player is to destroy enough enemies in order to collect the necessary alphabet letters to make this motorcycle turn into a car, these letters being A, B, C and D. Button 2 is used to shoot in both forms, while the combination of buttons 1 and 2 switches between motorcyle and car forms. By collecting further letters E and F you enable the car to automatically turn into a flying vehicle at a certain point in the stage’s course (prior to a bridge), and then this jet-car takes into the skies in standard shooting fashion. The action continues like that until the flying car lands by itself back into another driving area.

I want to fly!(courtesy of YouTube user Enrique Garcia)

During the driving parts you’re allowed to go faster or slower depending on how high you are on the screen (press ↑ and ↓). While you need to pay attention to the road signs that warn you about turns and splits, it’s often safer to drive faster in order to avoid getting touched by vehicles coming from below, but not so fast as to overtake the incoming cars and trucks. Getting rammed by an enemy and sent against the sides is deadly. Powering up the vehicle is done by getting inside the SEGA truck that appears from time to time: just align the motorcycle/car with the truck and see it get in and out, first with a double missile upgrade, then with a homing missile to be fired against helicopters (only in motorcycle form) and finally with 15 seconds of invincibility. Dying rips you off everything, except for the alphabet letters already collected.

During the flying parts it’s obviously not possible to revert back to motorcycle or car forms. Button 1 is then used to drop ground bombs in the famous Xevious style. In these sections upgrading the jet car’s firepower is done by means of small colored Ps that appear randomly. A yellow P serves as a single weapon power-up (get missiles), a white P works as speed-up, the green P is a screen-clearing bomb, the brown P corresponds to an extra life and the blue P gives you the temporary invincibility. From my experience, the great majority of the items consist of yellow and white Ps (power-ups and speed-ups). The others are very rare and I never got more than one of each in any of my runs. Just to have an idea, I came across the invincibility item only once.

One might think that going from motorcycle to car and then a flying machine is the strangest aspect in Action Fighter, but that’s actually not true. Just like in its mold Spy Hunter, lives are treated in a very weird way. At the start of the level they’re padded by a timer that starts at 999, and as long as this timer doesn’t reach zero you’re allowed to die without any consequence on your actual life stock (at this point dying only slows you down). Once the timer expires you’ll finally be playing with the regular life stock, where dying takes away a life and brings you closer to the GAME OVER screen. The real purpose of the timer is to cut you some slack towards surviving, since the better you play at the start of the level the less you’ll need to rely on your life stock before reaching the boss. However, while this may be true in the first two stages, the later flying sections are so long that regardless of performance you’ll be pretty much at the end of the timer when starting the intermediate driving section.

There are almost no bullets to be dodged in the driving parts of Action Fighter. Danger comes almost exclusively from other vehicles trying to ram into you. By the way, don’t feel bad by taking down those ambulances, they won’t think twice before doing the same to you. The only driving enemies capable of shooting at you are the 3-wheel motorcycles that appear from stage 3 onwards and the helicopters that drop bombs when reaching the top of the screen. To get rid of them you need to revert back to the motorcycle form and fire guided missiles with button 1, provided you’re upgraded to level 2 at least. If not don’t worry: just revert back and forth from car → motorcycle → car. Most of the time the helicopter gets scared and runs away when you do this. Remember that the car form is a lot more stable than the motorcycle, which is weak and prone to being run off the road by any other type of vehicle.

Three tanks = first part of the third boss

Gameplay rules change dramatically as you enter the flying area. Helicopters, drones, rockets, dirigibles and heat-seeking missiles all appear in different formations, and each one of these enemies must be dealt with specific approaches. Tanks, boats and harmless buoys, hatches and cars comprise the terrestrial opposition, often overlapping their presence with some sort of aerial attack. This wave-based action resembles Star Force, but there are a few aggravating aspects to it such as bullets and enemies being camouflaged by clouds or the awkward hit detection that makes it hard to collect the tiny red flags. I’m not sure, but I suppose these red flags interfere with the item generation routine while adding something to the score (Action Fighter is one of those games that don’t show your score unless you die or pause). Watch out for the cat’s face appearing at random once you collect enough flags... I have no idea what it actually does!

Driving and flying don’t always come in the same order throughout the game. With the exception of the second boss, all other bosses must be defeated while flying. When that happens you’ll continue flying as the next stage starts, with a mandatory landing and another flying section before facing the next boss. The overall enemy firing rate increases level after level, whereas later bosses toughen up quite a bit. They shoot lots of bullets and require lots of dodging. Bosses were the reason why I gave up on the game years ago when playing it with one of those awful stock Master System controllers (everybody knows they suck for precise 8-way movement). This time I went into battle armed with a Mega Drive controller and a Rapid Fire unit. Action Fighter has no autofire, so unless you can mash that button 2 hard you’d better get yourself some means of turbo firing.

Final verdict on Action Fighter? I could say it’s fun, but I’d be partially lying. It's an intense challenge, but it's also repetitive in every aspect you can think of. The soundtrack lacks variety and comes
with one recurring theme for each part of the game (driving, flying,
boss), but at least the sound effects were handled rather nicely. The main issue, however, is that the game demands too much to start getting fun. Dodging feels a little clunky at first and there are no continues whatsoever. Bullets are always aimed but tend to vary in speed, often cornering you when you least expect it. Most scoring opportunities are left for the end of the game because the
final boss is worth a lot more points than all previous bosses. There’s
an extend routine that grants roughly one extra life per level, but
you’ll only see changes in the life stock when the timer phase ends or
when you pick up the brown P.

My 1CC high score is shown below. You need to enter your initials/name before starting the credit, just like in the arcade version of Side Arms.